


Cracks in Our Foundations

by tosca1390



Category: NCIS
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-26
Updated: 2010-10-26
Packaged: 2017-10-14 15:56:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/150972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tosca1390/pseuds/tosca1390
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>He knew how to bring her up short.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Cracks in Our Foundations

**Author's Note:**

> Post-ep for _Cracked_. Guys, this is not the fic I've been writing for the last three weeks. Stupid writing urges. I have an opus on the summer between seasons, but _nooooo_ , let's write post-eps instead.

*

 _We are not talking about a man here, we are talking about you._

Those words, flippant and light, still cut Tony, even in the late evening two days later as he sat at his desk, alone.

Ignored in his desk drawer, his phone went off over and over. Skin still itching from the polyester from his brief encounter with Saturday Night Fever and a truly nuts Ethel (with whom he had definitively ended things with, before he ended up dressing up like Roger Rabbit), he couldn’t bear to see her texts. She was insistent, he could say that, but not his particular brand of insistent.

Not like Ziva was.

He stared at his computer screen, fists clenched near his keyboard. Why didn’t he have anything to say back to her? This was a softer, gentler, quieter Ziva, he’d said as much to McGee just a few weeks ago, and he knew how to bring her up short. He had a whole summer and year of stumbling blocks and awkward sideways glances to work with.

The sun sat low in the horizon, the floor to ceiling windows glowering orange in the sunset. Halloween had passed, and all he’d wanted to do was something fun, something with everyone, to celebrate the unity. They’d made it through another year intact, despite Eli David and Mexican drug lords, and for some deep-seeded reason Tony wanted to make something of it, something good.

Over the last five years, there hadn’t always been so much good to celebrate.

“You are still here.”

All the hair on the back of his arms prickled upwards. He looked up, finding a somber Ziva staring back at him, at the edge of their partition. “Yeah. Paperwork,” he said quietly.

She approached him, head tilted curiously. “Abby and I, we have been trying to reach you.”

He nodded towards the desk drawer. “Ethel’s not taking it well.”

Ziva smirked, a flash of before. “The film gods were not so willing to forgive then?”

Shaking his head, he smiled briefly. “Not so much, no.”

Her smile faded, mouth lined and seriously. “Tell me, do you think Abby is going to be all right? After this case, I wonder—”

“She’s Abby. She’s always fine,” he said shortly, as worry crept over him like a deep frost. Everyone _had_ to stay fine—

Ziva smoothed her black sweater over her middle, her hair soft and curly over her shoulders. His fingertips itched with the urge to skim along the line of her body over the smooth cashmere, to touch the springing curls. She’d been wearing her hair like that for months now; it reminded him of the first years they’d known each other, of before awkward reunions and summers of torture and a weird year of in-betweens.

Would she ever be better, or more like her old self again? He couldn’t help but wonder.

“She took this case very seriously,” she said quietly, leaning a hip against the ledge of his desk. “It was solved, I know, but she still carries that book of poetry, and—“

He looked down at his desk, gritting his teeth against the vibration of his phone. “Abby’s always—“

“No, not always! We are not always okay, Tony,” Ziva interjected sharply, her voice cracking.

When he looked at her, he saw small fissures in the smooth lines of her face, the quiet stillness and cheer she’d pressed upon herself since the spring finally shuddering. He stood hastily, unsure of his footing. Her mouth was soft and breakable, her gaze uneven. The memory of her body against his just weeks past, her slow smile, her eyes in the darkness of their hotel room years and years ago, it overwhelmed him—

She swallowed hard, visibly. “I only mean that—I still—“

He knew what was coming next; he could beat her to it, he knew her that well. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there, Ziva,” he said abruptly.

Blinking, she rearranged her face into smooth, even, lying lines. “Where?”

“At the ceremony.”

Something in her gaze hardened. “I understand why,” she said slowly.

He shrugged, sheepish. “It doesn’t—it doesn’t make it okay. It doesn’t make me feel better.”

Her eyes, steady and even on him, heated the back of his neck, made his collar seem too tight. “It does not make me feel better either,” she said, words lilting sadly.

It had been months and months of silences and awkward moments, teasing that cut just too close to the bone; the lingering knot in his chest relaxed its grip just the slightest. “I’ll make it up to you,” he said quietly.

She pressed her chin to her shoulder, looking away. “I have heard that before.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not your dad,” he said sharply.

“He was not all bad,” she retorted, cheeks pink.

He found the scooped curve of her neckline distracting, the scent of her strawberry shampoo hovering in the air between them. “Taught you how to throw knives and everything.”

Crossing her arms over her middle, she glared at him. “And yours taught you how to treat women, apparently.”

Bristling, he raised a brow. She knew that was a low blow. “I do my best.”

“Obviously,” she said tartly.

The silence that followed hung heavily between them in the dying sunlight. Dark shadows stretched out over the floor, across her body; she looked as if for a moment she was about to disappear. Words he’d wanted to say for years hung at the tip of his tongue, waiting for the right moment—

“I know how you can make it up to me,” she said finally, catching him mid-breath.

He faltered just for a moment, staring at her pale, curved face, the waves of curls; he felt the tightrope underneath them, the tricky balance, and he exhaled slowly. “Don’t keep me in suspense,” he said, forcing his usual smirking grin.

She rolled her eyes. “Take me to a baseball game.”

“Season’s just about over. We could trek out to Texas, but I don’t know if that counts as vacation time,” he said with a shrug.

Her face fell just the slightest, and he immediately regretted his quick words. “Next season, though. Opening Day for the Nationals, you and me and hot dogs and Cracker Jacks. I promise,” he added quickly.

The small smile lit up her face, and the knot in his chest returned, tighter than ever. “I will hold you to this.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” he said, more seriously than he’d intended.

Their eyes met just briefly; he just about felt the air spark between them, and god couldn’t he break Rule Number Twelve yet?

“Abby wants to get a drink,” Ziva said finally, smoothing her hair back from her face. “Come along.”

He was quick to grab his phone and his bag, following on her heels. “Seriously, did I really look like Fat Elvis?” he asked after a moment of waiting for the elevator, sounding piteous even to his own ears, but he had to _know_.

In the elevator, Ziva just laughed and laughed; he couldn’t help but smile along, watching the curved lines of her mouth and body the whole time.

 _Almost_.

*  



End file.
